Question from Anonymous: “Ryan Adams or The Beatles?”

How you just gonna ask me that?

Well, you probably already know that I’m not just going to pick one.  If this were a Facebook relationship status, it would be “it’s complicated.”

As you also probably already know, this is an apples-and-oranges question for me.  Not that Ryan wasn’t possibly influenced a little, at least indirectly, by the Beatles (I maintain that he channels John Lennon in “Beautiful Sorta“)—everyone was, pretty much—but they’re not exactly musical colleagues.

Thus, it would be beyond absurd to discuss the musical merit of each and somehow come up with a “winner.”  I guess the intent of the question is closer to which is my preference, or which means more to me.

I don’t know.  Weirdly, I don’t listen to either on a regular basis.  Is that shocking?  Let me explain, if I can.  Yes, I have both of their catalogues pretty much memorized.  Yes, I list each of them at the top of the list of…just about every earthly thing that I love the most. 

There’s just this point that a small number of artists reach in my consciousness that I will awkwardly label for the purposes of this post as The Point of Meaning Too Much.  I’ve cried myriad times over myriad songs by both artists.  I have at least one memory attached to each song of each, as well.  Each has given me chills, blown my mind, freaked me out, altered my thinking, widened my eyes, and caused me to shake my head on hundreds, if not thousands, of occasions.

I just can’t handle that kind of thing too often.  I save my iPod spins of each of them for when I get a specific album jones—for instance, sometimes you just need the White Album—or even a specific song jones.  I mean, how would I have ugly-cried my way through a handful of heartaches without “Now That You’re Gone“? 

I’ve years’ worth of evidences of my obsessions with both the Beatles and Ryan Adams.  The former changed everything for me in my adolescence.  The latter changed everything for me in my early 20s.  I’m not willing to part with either.

***

I’m closing in on the questions that have been sitting in my Formspring inbox for weeks!  Ask me more.

2010
03/10
CATEGORY
formspring
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1 comment

Question from Anonymous: “Who were your teachers (if you can remember) in elementary school and state a fact/memory/sentence about each?”

I love this question, only I kind of wonder how old the asker thinks I am.  I do remember each elementary school teacher very specifically, and I have at least a couple of very vivid memories attached to each.

Having been a teacher myself in recent previous lives, I’ve learned over and over just what they went through to help me—some things there would have been no way to have understood had I not gone through them myself.  Having been an adult for a little while, I’ve seen over and over as well just how important the job of a teacher is—how, indeed, we really don’t go a day without using at least some lesson we learned in school—and the job of an elementary teacher is fundamentally so.

It will be hard to stick with just one “fact/memory/sentence” about each of these women—so I probably won’t—but here goes.

Kindergarten—Ms. F—There were two kindergarten teachers, and Ms. F wasn’t the pretty young one that everyone wanted as their teacher.  I’m sure the pretty young one loved her students, but no one could have loved us more than Ms. F did.  No one.  She talked to us like we were intelligent little human beings.  A few years back, I heard she had died of cancer.  I felt a personal loss, though I hadn’t seen her in probably 15-20 years.

1st Grade—Ms. W—Um.  She was a good teacher, I will give her that.  She was also moody and sometimes unfair, especially to those of us she knew outside of school.  She was a member of the congregation where my dad preached, and that did not always bode well for me.

2nd Grade—Ms. H—Also a member of the congregation where my dad preached, but the complete opposite of Ms. W.  Ms. H was actually what you could call a family friend, and as I grew up in that town, she and her husband became sort of my local grandparents.  As a teacher, she too was in the profession out of a deep, true love for kids.  She only had the use of one arm because she had had polio as a child herself, but she did more with that one arm than most of us do with two.

3rd Grade—Ms. P—Again, I got the teacher that year that no one wanted of the two options.  I could not be more pleased that I got her.  She was olllllllld and cranky, and if it weren’t for her, I don’t know if I’d have what little math abilities I have retained.

4th Grade—Ms. H2—She looked (and even kind of acted) like Merryweather the fairy from Sleeping Beauty, only with gray hair.  Also a good teacher, as I recall, but I mainly remember her as acting a lot older and stuffier than she really was—she had a son in the same grade as my little sister, so she couldn’t have been that old.  Perceptions of adults are so distorted when you’re a kid.

5th Grade—Ms. P2—Oh, hey, whaddya know, another lady I knew from church.  (It was a really small town and a really, really small school.)  She was great.  Very strict, very regimented, sometimes disliked, mostly respected.  I miss what she represented.  We don’t have it in schools much anymore.  I’ve seen her a couple of times through the years, and she’s long since retired, but any interaction I’ve had with her as an adult has only confirmed what a classy person she is, in addition to having been an exceptional teacher.

We started changing classes in 6th grade, so I guess that’s when junior high started, though the school was technically a K-8 elementary school.  I’m thankful to have gone through grade school at the time and in the place that I did.

And, because I’m feeling generous and masochistic, I thought I’d give you an illustration for this particular post.  Behold, Holly in her elementary school days.  Not sure how old I am in that picture.  The hand I hold is my little sister’s, who was cuter than me, so she got chopped.  The mismatched bow I wear in my hair only vaguely conceals the fact that I have a near-mullet.  It was before I got glasses, so I’m guessing I’m about 7 here.  Believe it or not, this doesn’t even really qualify for “awkward phase.”  It’s more like “awkward pre-awkward phase.”  There are pictures of the real awkwardness, but I’m…not ready to show you those.

Edit:  I always forget to remind you where these questions are from—visit my Formspring, won’t you?  I’ll answer just about anything, unless it’s dirty or mean.  Or unanswerable (i.e., a tongue twister with a question mark at the end).

2010
03/09
CATEGORY
formspring
TAGS

9 comments

Feel-good Friday, in honor of last weekend edition.

I never told you about my concert!  In a word, it was, of course, awesome.  I enjoyed myself even more than I realized I would.  The headliner, Eric Clapton, was just sick.  I mean, if I could make that…sound that he makes with a guitar…well, I’d just sit at home with a guitar and make it all day.  Every single day.  He makes it look effortless.  I loved just letting him transport me for a couple of groovy bluesy hours.  Surprise guest Vince Gill was pretty impressive, too!

I got to hear most of the songs I would have requested.  I had wanted to maybe hear some Cream, though, which he didn’t play.  I don’t know if that’s something he does anymore or not, honestly.  But, in honor of a solidly great show, and in honor of the sunshine (and hope of more sunshine to come) we’re enjoying, I give you the song with the opening riff I would sit and play all day in the aforementioned stay-at-home-with-the-guitar scenario:

Also, ROGER DALTREY.  Wow.  He’s still got almost every bit of his voice, and he’s got a great band backing him too.  Sadly, as opening act, he got less than an hour to play.  I could have listened for well over an hour more.  He played several Who songs, as well as several I’d never heard.

He mentioned that he’d played several pretty momentous concerts with The Who, but that playing the Ryman a while back had been the biggest deal for him.  (I love, so much, how every artist who plays Nashville has a little something extra to say in tribute to our city—I know artists personalize shows to whatever city they’re playing, but it’s just different here, somehow.)  One of the concerts he mentioned was the Concert for New York in the wake of 9/11.

That memory struck at my heart a little.  I remember watching that concert on TV, all drained and scared and just tired, and The Who’s performance of “Baba O’Reilly” was one of the first things I remember actually getting through and letting me know things really could be okay again.  Townsend doing the windmill-guitar thing, Daltrey pumping his fists….it reminded me about rock and roll.  It had been pretty easy to forget that and just about every other passion I had at that point.

Those are some vivid images in my heart, and I will always be grateful for that performance and its needed effect.  And I got to hear Roger Daltrey play it!  Though I must admit it was more odd than I’d have realized to hear him scream “teenage WASTE-land!” I was still thrilled.

2010
03/04
CATEGORY
face-rocking
feel-good friday
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10 comments

Thankful Thursday.

Yes, it’s back, but briefly.  As always, it’s not that I’ve not been thankful all this time, it’s just that I haven’t always made the time to express it.  And, well, I’m thankful for the same things every week pretty much.  A few for today:

1.  Sunshine!  Non-subarctic temperatures!  It’s [insert synonym for 'crisp' since I hate that word] outside right now, but nowhere near what it has been. 

1.a.  And look at the weekend, Nashville!  It’s gonna be plum balmy.

2.  The public library.  I’ve said it a jillion times before:  I think the public library is the best thing civilization has ever come up with. 

2.a.  A job that puts me a couple of blocks away from the beautiful main branch of the Nashville Library.  I’m like a junkie.

3.  Leeann’s garage.  I’ve never lived in a house with a garage before.  It’s the most amazing thing, and I marvel at it every morning.  It was especially great not to have to go out in the crazy weather a few weeks ago during the first couple of chapters of The Situation 2010.  I don’t have to scrape ice off the windshield, and in the summer, I won’t have to get sunburned walking to my car (you think I’m exaggerating, but I’m just that anglo).

4.  My new water bottle.  I invested in a Good Life bottle, which arrived in the mail yesterday.  I’ve become a lot more aware of my body since I started massage school, and one change I’m making is to try to get the right amount of water per day.  It goes beyond the eight-glasses rule, though—according to my instructor (and several other sources, if you want to do some internet research), you should divide your body weight in half, then get that amount of water in ounces per day.  For some of us, that’s a pretty big number.  I’d been using a glass bottle that was originally unsweetened tea, I think, in order to avoid creating the waste and ingesting the toxins of plastic.  The bottle wasn’t big enough, though, and short of creating hash marks, I was losing count of how many trips to the water cooler I was making.  I thought I may as well make an investment in something bigger that would also encourage me to keep it up.

It’s amazing!  It’s shiny and pretty, and you know I like shiny pretty things.  I got the purple because purple and green are my favorite colors, but I wasn’t sure I’d like the green color that was on the website.  It doesn’t have all those drawbacks of plastic.  And, you can go hot or cold with it, and the outside temperature doesn’t change, so your hand doesn’t get cold with condensation or burn up.

Makes me want to fill it with freshly-French-pressed coffee, drive up to a mountain outlook, gaze out at it, and…drink the coffee, I guess?

5.  A blog upon which I can write 2+ paragraphs about a shiny purple bottle, and readers who at least pretend to care.

Lots more, but gotta get back to my job (that I’m still really, really thankful for as well).

2010
03/04
CATEGORY
i love blogging
thankful thursday
TAGS




6 comments

Question from Anonymous: “Star Wars or Star Trek?”

This one is a no-brainer for me, then it gets slightly complicated.  And by “complicated,” I mean “mundane and possibly disappointing.”

Star Wars.  No contest.  I don’t get Star Trek, and I never have.  I even remember falling asleep during one of the Star Trek movies my parents took me to the theater to see when I was a kid.  I was usually pretty susceptible to whatever entertainment was going on around me (still am, actually), but Star Trek just never took.

Star Wars, though…well, Star Wars was childhood.  I don’t remember ever being alive without having watched Star Wars.  Pretty sure this was somehow an in utero thing.  I loved it, and I was thrilled when the rereleases came out when I was in high school.  I insisted we be there for every episode on the day it hit the theater.

Then came the prequels.  I think I even liked the first one, or said I did, anyway.  And the second one—was that the one where Yoda gets crazy with the lightsaber?  I liked that part.  It must have been the second one, because I don’t even think I bothered with the third one.  Not saying they were bad…just saying I didn’t care for them.  And I ended up not caring about them.  Which was sad.

What’s sadder is that it made me feel kind of meh about the whole franchise.  I don’t even remember a whole lot about the originals now, and I haven’t watched them in years.  I still have my worn-out set of VHSs, covered over with DVDs, sitting in a crate in Leeann’s living room.  I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of them even though my VCR is a relic itself, gathering dust in storage.

It’s not like I was ever obsessed with it—promise—and, in fact, sometimes I forget which movie featured which line or little weird creature.  I still have a cherished pastiche of images and sounds from the films woven into my subconscious, though, much like the same has been permanently woven into my beloved pop culture for decades now.

Some moments stick out, mostly from Episode IV.  I’ve been known to pull out my frantic Leia impression sometimes—I had gotten pretty good at the “look back, then turn back around” part—when imploring someone to help me because they’re my “only hope.”  (Not often, but it’s happened.)  I have more frequently been known to advise someone to “always let the wookiee win.”  I even had a tee shirt that said that at one time.

(Also, two words you don’t want to get me started on? “I know.”)

You really don’t even have to have been a fan of the movies, though, to recognize those quotes.  I never was such a fanatic that I tripped out over details or anything.  Still, Star Wars means a lot to me, and in my world, there’s no contest at all between it and Star Trek.  I can’t even imagine thinking otherwise.  I’d rather be a scruffy nerf-herder.

As such, I leave you with my favorite scene from Fanboys, which beautifully encapsulates the neverending epic battle between Star Wars fans and Trekkies.  (It’s slightly NSFW in a couple of places, and you’ll have to bear with my boyfriend—this was while we were broken up for a while and he’d let himself go.)

***

Use the force and visit my Formspring page.

2010
03/02
CATEGORY
formspring
movies
TAGS



7 comments

Weekend update.

I realized I haven’t just sat down and told you about the state of things around these parts, so…here you go:

Job:

I do really like this job, just as much as I did the first time I did it three years ago.  It’s just right for me—they give me some writing to do and then just let me do it.  No phone ringing, no crap to take home, just a job to do at my job.  I wish I could keep it.

Cons:  politicians all around.  Ugh.  And, another picky thing—I share an office with two other people (not the con), and each of our workstations is in a corner with the computer screen (and our respective backs) to the center of the room.  Not that I look at anything untoward on my computer, but I just don’t like people’s seeing whatever is on my screen, regardless of what it is.  I’ve also grown to hate conversations that go on behind me, even when they’re innocuous and don’t concern me (though they are especially annoying when my co-workers get on a roll about some political something or another).  There’s no blocking it, no matter how high I turn up the volume into my earbuds. 

Honestly?  That’s about all the bad I can say, which, compared to my last couple of jobs, is a big deal.  I wish I could keep this job.  It has a lot of pros:  the aforementioned being left alone to write, its location downtown, the ability to study or surf the net or blog during lulls in workload.  I don’t think they’re planning on making the position permanent, though, and I have one co-worker who already seems to be gunning for it if it is, so I doubt I’d have much of a chance anyway.

All in all, though, I’d call it my second favorite job I’ve ever had.  I’ll let you guess which was the first.

School:

Hoo boy.  I just finished my second module of my massage therapy program last night.  It was not what I would call a personal success, I must admit.  I passed the class, thankfully, but the fact that I had at least a little bit of a question was troubling.  It was a module on the nervous system, and I’m sorry, but that stuff is hard.  I’m gaining more and more respect for the medical professionals among us as I’m going along.

The fatigue also officially set in this module.  Simply put, I’m tired of working full-time and going to class for 3+ hours three nights a week.  BUT, I’m also very thankful for this opportunity and don’t want to complain too much.  I think this module was one of the harder ones, and I’m hoping to start fresh next week with module 3.

Life with Leeann:

Leeann is the awesomest roommate I’ve ever had, and I’m not saying that because she holds in her hands the power of whether I have a roof over my head or not.  I also say it knowing it will make her feel awkward, which admittedly makes me giggle.  I also also say it knowing the unfortunate nature of such statements—how they tend to be harbingers of doom to come.

I just know I’m loving living in her house with her dogs and her ginormous TV, upon which we have movie night almost every night.  Neither of us, I think, would have chosen to live with someone else, as we both have misanthropic tendencies, but I think we’re both at points in our pseudo-adulthood wherein it works.  Whatever.  We make each other laugh and leave each other alone and do our best to work out unfortunate animal issues.

Oh, right—animal issues.  Dorian, Charley, and Delgado have been able to forge a tentative peace in the past month of cohabitation.  Sometimes a doggie will take a wild hare and chase Dorian down the hall, or Dorian will hiss at a doggie out of seemingly nowhere, but most of the time they can share a room peacefully.  If Dorian will just stop chewing the plants, my place in the house will be secure.

Overall:

Life is pretty good.

2010
02/26
CATEGORY
dor dor
the job
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11 comments

It’s Johnny’s birthday.

I still miss that man.

2010
02/26
CATEGORY
videos
TAGS

6 comments

Feel-good Friday, Mama’s got a squeezebox edition.

“I know you’re at work, but get on IM, I have a question.”

“[sigh] Okay, just a second.”

on IM:

“Are you free the 27th?  Your daddy really wants to see Clapton with Roger Daltrey and we want to take you with us.”

“Well, YEAH!”

And that’s how my life became an inverted Freaks and Geeks episode.  Sort of.  (We’ll go ahead and put aside the fact that my mom is conversant on IM for the time being.)  Of course it’s going to be a rare treat to see a guitar deity such as Mr. Clapton, but for some reason, I’m just really stoked about seeing the lead singer of The Who.

I immediately thought of the episode of Freaks and Geeks in which Lindsey’s parents try to decide if she can go see The Who in concert by listening to their music to see if it’s obscene.  Below is one of my favorite scenes from the whole series—just so funny and endearing.

My parents, of course, are way cooler than hers.

2010
02/25
CATEGORY
family
feel-good friday
TAGS




3 comments

Question from Anonymous: “What is your least favorite thing about yourself?”

Have you read my blog before?

Ha.  J/k, as they say.  I’m pretty bad about self-deprecation, so there are several things I could consider and several I’ve written about.  Maybe that should be my answer.  

As for my actual answer, I guess, as evidenced by the above, I often think I’m too sarcastic.  It’s gotten me into trouble before—not just by making someone mad, but, well, it’s not the best quality to have as a teacher, so you can imagine some of the situations I’ve gotten myself into.

It’s definitely a defense mechanism.  I don’t know if that’s first and foremost what it is for me now, but I’m pretty sure that’s where it began long ago.  I remember kids my age not “getting it” when I’d say something snide and deadpan back during school days.  I think maybe the popular kids were going to automatically have their jokes laughed at, so they didn’t really have to develop real humor or wit.  And, being the ultimate cocktail of non-cool (chubby, poodle-permed, purple-plastic-bespectacled, A-student preacher’s kid), I guess I had a little more to be sarcastic about.

Thus, sometimes, the things I was saying as my own little inside joke with myself could be an issue.  I remember there was a cute coach that all the girls had a crush on in high school.  He was definitely cute, but looking back, I probably just espoused a crush to hide my actual crush on the weird-eyed, scraggly-haired Biology teacher who, one of my classmates once said, in a moment of wittiness of his own, looked like “he might actually be dissecting people at home.”  Whatev, he had a soul patch.

Anyway, back to cute coach.  I don’t remember context, but I remember once at lunch making the unfortunate statement, “oh, yeah, you know I have Coach wrapped around my little finger!”  Those exact words.  The sight gag alone—I’d started to evolve toward a semi-swanhood at that point, but I was still probably closer to the duckling—should have made my sarcasm obvious, but my “friends” were horrified nonetheless.

And they laughed.

And that was high school.

It got better in college—it became appreciated, actually, by most.  From then on, though, it was not just self-defense—it was default.  It had also developed from my taste in humor, which arguably was a chicken-and-egg situation.  Let’s just say Daria was a welcome relief by the time the show premiered around the time I graduated high school.

Whatever it stems from, it’s such a part of my m.o. that I don’t really know what I would be like without it.  Problem is, I’ve figured out that it makes me seem a lot snottier than I am; of course, since I’ve been a pretty sarcastic person for several years, it stands to reason that I might actually be that snotty, for all practical purposes.

I don’t like that thought.

I do know that I have confused lots of people lots of times with my snark.  I’ve made people think I was mad at them.  When that happens, saying “I was just kidding!” only serves to make them think you’re trying to dig yourself out of the situation (and zaps the humor right out of the situation, too).

I don’t know.  If I were super funny, it might be worth it.  I mean, there are people I follow on Twitter who can, with a few deadpan words, make me snort at my desk.  I don’t know if they’re complete and total jerks in real life, and I don’t care.  Say what you want, that’s a gift. 

My sarcasm only reaches the “gifted” point occasionally.  Maybe quarterly-ish.  Otherwise, I fear it just comes off as just Holly being her snide self. 

I’ve actually tried to give up sarcasm before so that people would know I really was a nice person.  It obviously didn’t happen.  I guess it’s just easier to hide behind irony than to be exposed by sincerity.

So there you go. 

Formspring me, won’t you?  I’m really looking forward to hearing from you *rolls eyes*.

2010
02/22
CATEGORY
formspring
TAGS

4 comments

Question from Anonymous: “Destiny, Fate, or a combination of both?”

I tend to think of destiny and fate as basically the same thing, since both assume, in general, that the way things happen is the way they are “meant to be.”  I have a hard time being fully on board for either as a staunch believer in free will.  I have a feeling that’s what this asker meant, however; in short, I’d say a combination of providence and individual choice.

To really get into my beliefs on this would involve too much theologicalizing and philosophizing and, truthfully, B.S.-ing, so I’ll give you as basic and non-nuanced a summary as I can:

I think God is in charge.  I also think I can make my own decisions.  I think it all comes out in the wash.  I think I’d better be careful.  I think we’re in good hands.

For more from your Armchair (or, Cubicle) Oracle, visit my formspring.

2010
02/22
CATEGORY
formspring
TAGS




2 comments

Click here to ask me a question:

http://www.formspring.me/hollywynne

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